Spock's Ego: Not my review of Star Trek

Warning:  Post contains minor spoilers.  The Salon review I link to contains MAJOR ones.

Going to take me a bit to work my way into writing a proper review.  It's not that it's a difficult film to write about.  I liked it.  I'm just having trouble figuring out how to say what I liked about it---You remember The Enemy Within, the episode from the original TV series in which a transporter accident divides Kirk into a good Kirk and a bad Kirk?  When I think about the movie, my brain divides into the good Lance, the happy geek and fanboy, and the bad Lance, the grumpy critic and grouchy adult who remembers what it was like to be a fan but thinks that's no excuse for letting filmmakers off the hook.

So, while the two Kirks fight it out inside my head and my inner Spock tries to figure out how to put the two back together, here's a review from Stephanie Zacherek at Salon that includes some points I'll probably agree with when I get around to writing my own review, like this one:

The casting is one of the most joyous aspects of "Star Trek." As the show's cast members trundled their way through numerous "Star Trek" movies (the last of those featuring the original actors was the 1991 "Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country"), they became increasingly paunchier and puffier. You might applaud them for soldiering on, but watching them age became a little depressing, especially since their youth was eternally on display in reruns and video and DVD sets. The actors here lovingly restore youth to the characters, which is its own way of paying tribute to the actors who originally played them. John Cho captures the sparkling, businesslike efficiency of George Takei's Sulu; Karl Urban has all the wry, no-nonsense charm of DeForest Kelley's Leonard "Bones" McCoy; and while the English of Anton Yelchin's Chekhov may be more intentionally mangled than Walter Koenig's was, he still makes words like "inwisible" sound like a subtle tribute.

Zacherek gives Zoe Saldana's Uhura her own paragraph of praise, but she leaves out Simon Pegg as Scotty, who was one of the best things about the movie.  I'd also point out that Cho makes Sulu a bigger bad-ass than Takei's Sulu was ever allowed to be. (Not counting his bad-ass alternative universe self in Mirror, Mirror.)  In the timeframe of the original Star Trek, starship captains were all hardcases of one type or another and Sulu was the only one of the original crew who was meant to be command material.

But I take issue with one of Zacherek's points.  This is how she describes Kirk and Spock's initial antipathy:

Pine's Kirk, freewheeling and fast-thinking, makes decisions from the gut; he's the frat boy to Spock's honor student.

No, not exactly, although that may be how a real-life human version of Spock might see a real-life human version of Kirk.

Zacherek confesses to not having been as devoted a Trek fan as I was, so I'll give her a pass on missing this.

Kirk and Spock are not classmates at Starfleet Academy.  Spock and Kirk meet at the Academy in the movie because Spock, who is already a Lieutenant Commander, the rank he held in the TV series, is back as an instructor, and Spock's dislike for Kirk is based on exactly what it ought to be---anger.  The anger of a teacher at a student he has caught cheating.

Kirk, in his turn, resents Spock for catching him.

This leads to one of Bones' best lines, but nevermind.

Maybe this is a minor point, but I think it's something that the movie adds to the character of Spock, something that was there in Leonard Nimoy's portrayal but that the series never got into.  Spock has an ego.

And he needs to get over it.

Which is exactly Kirk's problem.

The differences between Kirk and Spock are obvious and often discussed.  The ways they are alike?  Not so much.

But they are alike.  They are both brilliant, ambitious, highly motivated and incredibly self-disciplined and self-contained.  Both have always been the smartest and most talented person in almost any room they've entered.  And both have to struggle to control their emotions.  The movie almost slides it past us, but it's there---Kirk is an honors student.  He's finished the Academy's four year course of study in three and we know how he did it---by being the biggest grind the Academy's ever seen, except for, perhaps, Spock.  We don't see him as a student until he's at the very end of his academic career when he's succumbing to a particularly advanced case of senior-itis.  But he's obviously been a brilliant student, and Spock knows this about him when he catches him cheating.  He knows that Kirk is the guy who's threatening Spock's own reputation as the best the Academy has ever produced and now he's got Kirk's career in his hands.

Zachary Quinto captures Spock's professional outrage, but he also lets Spock's vanity show.  This is a test for Spock, and Spock fails it.  It's a great addition, because it humanizes Spock some more, but also puts us squarely on Kirk's side.  Kirk would never have done this to another student.  Of course, we're being put on the side of a cheater, but this resonates with the series.  We know that Kirk will survive and save the galaxy again and again because he cheats.  At the Academy, Kirk is not simply cheating on a test.  The Kobayashi Maru is the first time we see him cheat Death.

Spock doesn't get it in the movie, and we know from the series and the movies that followed that it will be a very long time into their friendship before he does get it.

We know that Kirk was almost from the first (but now thanks to the movie we know not from the very first) aware of all the ways Spock was a better person than himself.  But now thanks to the movie we can suspect that it took Spock a while to appreciate the ways Kirk was a better person than him.  What this means is that the Spock we know might have seen Kirk as a rival who had in a way that was a mystery to Spock unfairly jumped ahead of him.

Kirk is not and was not a frat boy.  Frat boys are joiners.  Kirk isn't a loner, but he's on a path very few other people can follow and traveling at a pace almost no one else can match---the movie makes a point of demonstrating that all the members of the original crew are geniuses in their way, and they'd have to be or Kirk would have left them all behind, with disastrous results, since Kirk's success depends on his having this group of lieutenants.  At the Academy, nobody except Bones and a few frisky alien chicks likes him.  He goes out of his way to make himself obnoxious, through his arrogance, seeming carelessness, and lapses into bad temper, but we get the feeling, transmitted through Uhura in another of the movie's additions to the series, that what bothers other people, particularly other brilliant, hardworking, rule-abiding people like Uhura, is that he outrages their sense of fairness.  Kirk has been granted too many gifts.  "Nobody," they can't help thinking, "should be that much better than me.  Nobody should be that good."

And Spock is not immune to that feeling.

Of course, he wouldn't admit it's a feeling.

To him it's a logical conclusion.  Here's this smart-alek Kirk, supposed to be one of the top students the Academy's ever had, and he's just cheated on an important test.  What's more, not only is he not ashamed of it, he seems to think he should be rewarded for his ingenuity.  He refuses to admit he's done wrong or to admit he understands the point of the test.  A test Spock designed to be impossible to pass.  It's impossibility is the lesson.  And Kirk dismisses that lesson out of hand.    This is a blow to Spock's ego, but he can ignore that and focus on the logic.  Kirk is supposed to be brilliant, but he's a cheat, and he is contemptuous of the rules and the principles behind them.  It is logical to assume, then, that all of Kirk's success has been the due to cheating, and a cheater is not deserving of any respect or reward.

But then this cheater, through cheating again, gets himself into a place from which he can leapfrog over Spock on the career path.

Most illogical.

In the movie, Spock gets past this.  But we don't know that he gets over it.  The possibility is left open that he still hasn't gotten over it when we catch up with him again in the series.  We know that he will get over it.  But it's important to note what that it is.

It's his own vanity.  His own ambition.  His own ego. 

The point will come when Spock realizes and can admit that James T. Kirk is not just the better officer, but in many ways the better person.  (It would be illogical for Spock not to recognize and take into account Kirk's numerous flaws.)  And this realization is liberating.

He is excused.  He doesn't have to be what he's been striving to be, but can't ever be---a cooler-headed version of Kirk.  As Matt Zoller Seitz pointed out in his video essay, Starfleet is a place where Spock went to hide from his divided nature.  The uniform is a disguise he can get away with wearing.  As a Starfleet officer, he is neither human nor Vulcan, but he is not necessarily himself.  It's through his friendship with Kirk that he learns to see himself as his own person.

In the movie we get to see Spock at both ends of his career.  We see him as a young, ambitious career military type, and we see him as the prophet of Peace.  It is made plain before our eyes that Spock's future greatness, a greatness that will eclipse Kirk's, lies not in his being a Starfleet officer, not even in his being a scientist, and not in his being either a Vulcan or a human.  It lies in his being a person of a singularly large heart that he opens up to the whole of the universe.

Which brings me to one of the things I liked best about Zacherek's review, her last paragraph, which is devoted to Leonard Nimoy's appearance in the movie:

And so when Nimoy appears in this "Star Trek" as the older counterpart to Quinto's character -- this is where that time-bending plot device comes in -- we get to see both the man Spock grew out of and the man he'll grow into. Nimoy is playing the character who's already been where Quinto is boldly going, and he looks wonderful. He's got the face of an actor who's actually lived, not of one who's tried to hide the effects of living. His youth is alive in him, as opposed to being an indistinct, vaguely remembered thing. And he's perfectly at home in a movie that recognizes how reinvention can be a form of rejuvenation. The original "Star Trek" aired only from 1966 to 1969; you could say its life didn't really begin until after it was canceled. With "Star Trek" Abrams honors the show's legacy without fossilizing its best qualities. Instead, he's whisked it off to a planet where numbing nostalgia can't kill it, and where the future is still something to look forward to.

Comments

[minstrel hussain boy]

one of the things that always grabbed me about star trek, and spock in particular, was the way he was forced to deal with that duality. 1/2 human, 1/2 vulcan.

it was exactly the issue that i've dealt with my entire life. many times spock had to deal with the whole thing of being assigned the attributes of the half heritage he was not with at the moment.

spock, among vulcans, is at his most human. among humans, he is at his most vulcan.

it works the same way with me to this very day. when i am in the mood to feel very indian, i hang out in california. to feel like a white boy, all i have to do is go back to my arizona rez.

[actor212]

I liked the movie and in particular what you bring to bear here, Lance: not so much the characters themselves but how the interactions play out (granted this was the first movie and they had to make a choice, but it would have been nice to see more McCoy/Spock stuff. That's Kirk's id/superego conflict in the series).

Niggling points: not enough was done with Scotty. For example, Pegg probably should have been drunk when first we meet him (trying not to spoil it). The reboot of history allowed for a whole new series (ohgod) to be made, but it also raises about a billion questions with respect to what Kirk becomes, since indeed it is his life that is most changed by a certain other character who shall remain nameless.

You'd think there would be just the slightest bit of resentment at that.

I thought the portrayals of our beloved heroes was pretty much spot on, plus a little extra thrown in, without being cloying (see: Lost In Space, The Movie). Karl Urban as McCoy was about as direct a hit as the movie had, altho Zack Quinto came close as well.

I couldn't understand why Kirk seemed so different from Shatner's Kirk until...well, you know why.

As to Spock's ego...I don't think he ever really gets over it. If he does, I can pick two moments far into the future when he might: after his rebirth at Genesis or more likely, on ST:TNG when he is tasked with fomenting a rebellion on Romulus (and lays the groundwork for this movie, not ironically).

[Winnie]

Great analysis Lance...yeah one thing I really like about the movie is how unashamedly elitist it is; everyone on board the Enterprise has to be really talented and really worked themselves hard to get on that ship. And yes, Spock and Kirk *do* have a lot more in common than either one can admit to themselves; they're both brilliant, ambitious, neither one likes to lose, and they both feel like misfits to a certain extent. To my mind, as someone with Asperger's Spock feels like a perfect cinematic representation of that; even down to seeing scenes of him being bullied as a child. It's going to be fun to see the two of them grow in their friendship in future films as being really good for BOTH of them.

[vjs]

Best non-review review I've read so far. Looking forward to the real deal.

[Kevin Wolf]

I enjoyed the movie though I'm less happy with the new Kirk than most. Why, I can't exactly put my finger on. Still, I was happy to see what they came up with.

I'm wondering if you've seen Anthony Lane's review in the latest New Yorker. It's plain from word one that he isn't a fan of the franchise (I'd go so far as to say he shows disdain for the whole thing), so why he got the assignment to begin with is beyond me.

[Rana]

Kevin, I share your - dislike is too strong a word? - regarding the new Kirk. I think my beef is that, unlike the other characters, he is too dated. He's a typical 2000s male action hero - virtually indestructible (despite some surface bruising) and lots of aggression and not as many brains as I remember the original Kirk having (and, given that Shatner always made my eyes roll, that's saying something). Basically, he doesn't interest me in the way the other characters do, because I've seen too much of this type before.

That said, I think the actor playing him has potential, if allowed to exercise some initiative in the next film.

[Lance]

Kevin,

Haven't seen the Lane's review. I'll look at it this morning. Is it as contemptuous of Trek fans as his Watchmen review was of comic book fans?

Minstrel, that's a very interesting connection between you and Spock. Have you ever written about it? Would make a great essay.

Winnie, my eldest son is AS. I asked him the other day who his favorite character was in the movie and he said...Spock. I said, But he's not your favorite on the TV show is he. I thought you liked Kirk. He said, Oh yeah, I like Kirk, but I've always liked Spock the best. That was before I read your comment. Now I'm looking for a chance to bring your point up with him.

[Winnie]

Lance...here's some of the ways I see Spock as a fellow Aspie to your son and myself...

Spock is highly analytical and obsessed with logic...classic Aspie thinking. He is also easily irritated by illogical behavior which is also true of Aspies.

Spock does not express emotions in the way that most humans do...(though, he does experience them just doesn't express them in the typical fashion just like Aspies,) and indeed has trouble responding appropriately to emotional human displays...

Spock has trouble getting the jokes made by the humans.

Spock has incredible memory and is highly intelligent and gifted in certain very esoteric fields.

He is very sensitive to sensory surroundings.

He is comfortable spending long periods alone with his thoughts.

Spock's often uncomfortable with human displays of "touchy feely" style bonding. When Kirk says, "See we are getting to know each other," and then gives Spock an arm bump in familiarity the expression on Spock's face is priceless.

Spock is extremely literal and precise in his speech patterns.

Spock was bullied and harassed as a child...(sadly true for most Aspie children,) and has difficulty forming relationships be they simply friendly or romantic as an adult.

Spock often feels ambivalent and divided about his nature and set apart from everyone around him.

[C.C.]

I could not agree with you more, Winnie.

As an aspie, I find Spock not only the most relatable, but also an ideal hero for an aspie child. Numerous Star Trek characters have been compared to aspies, but Spock is the only one who I find to be truly validating.

He is a character who is comfortable and proud of who his unique identity. I think that is a lesson to be learned. We can try to conform as much as possible, but at some point we just need to be ourselves and be appreciated for our differences.

As for Scotty, I would have liked to see more of him, but there's always the next movie coming in 2012.